Conversations in Sherlock
by 1madscientist
Summary: The exchanges of Sherlock when there isn't a case on.
1. Googling Themselves

"What are you doing?" Sherlock swept over like a breeze of musk and peered over John's shoulder like a hawk.

"I'm on google." He barely turned his head to look at his flatmate.

"What's a google?" He said with the neutrality of an amnesiac.

"It's a site where you search for whatever you want to read about on the internet."

"It's an algorithym database."  
>"Er, yeah sure. Probably." He'd learnt to glaze over at the big words, it was humiliating to continually ask for explanations. The detective placed a gentle hand on his shoulder and leant slightly forward, unnerving eyes fixed on the screen. After a moment, he had to ask.<p>

"Why are you using it? The input box is blank." Sherlock thought he was looking up porn again and waiting for him to leave.  
>"Research actually."<br>"Oh, really?" The sarcastic tone only John could pick up on, barely there beneath a veil of pseudo-politeness.  
>"Yep. PR. I google myself and see what people think about me."<p>

"Surely that doesn't work, John." It was amazing how little his flatmate thought of other people, an alien quality that, while usually charming, was occasionally disturbing. His mind flickered back to the retort at Anderson, but John shook his head, resolved Sherlock was too obsessed with justice and doing the right thing to be a true sociopath. Mostly.

"It works, here, we can google ourselves and see what they think of us."  
>"They?"<br>"People. Regular people. Like the people who read my- er, our blogs." Sherlock let the slip-up go. John typed "sherlock holmes john watson". Sherlock chuckled because John put his name first, a sign of sentiment. Thankfully, the Grazi didn't mention the lack of capitalisations.  
>After a few seconds of lag flicker, the suggestions box appeared.<br>Sherlock's eyes widened and his nostrils flared, his mouth thinned but he said nothing regarding the suggestions.  
>"Oh."<p>

Sherlock broke his stony silence since John had spoken first. "Humans are so obsessed with sex. What matter is the nature of our relationship to them? They don't know us."

John tapped the table gently, thinking. "People care about these things."

"Why? Why do they care?"

"It's seen as a necessary requirement of humanity, love." Sherlock shot him a fiery look, like a dragon. John shrunk a little in his chair. " Er. You're sorta famous. People think it's their business to know about someone, even if they only know that person's name. It's kinda sweet, really, they idolise the successful and the funny and the talented, and you're so talented, Sherlock-"

Sherlock stood, technically towered over John. "Run the image search." He wasn't falling for the flattery.

"No." He knew being stubborn was useless, but he was proving a point.

"Do it."

John breathed deeply and clicked the blue Image button, same colour as Sherlock's eyes, he thought. Up popped 178,622 results. All with that hideous hat, at various sizes to insult the eyes.

"The hat. Again. Why the hat?"

"People like the hat." It was adorable, in a weird way. Seeing such a noble man brought down.

"It's a silly hat."

"That's why people like it." He would say it showed his funny side, but Sherlock was more funny-weird than funny-ha-ha, and he wasn't saying that out loud to a man who owned a gun, a riding crop, recreational opium and god knows what else under that bed of his.

"I suppose the only way to make the genius brain _under_ the hat more relatable is with a silly hat."

"Let's go with that."

Sherlock tied up his dressing gown firmly, with determination. "We're going hat shopping." Hands on his hips.

"I thought you didn't like hats." Historically they showed deference, or so Sherlock once told him. And Sherlock deferred to no one.

"Oh, not for me." He grinned wickedly and strode into the kitchen to check on the thumbs.

"Why do I need a hat?" John called over, whining. Sherlock wandered in, scribbling on a notepad.

"Because I have one. We're partners, right? Partners, -cough- professionally, of course."

"I'm not going round in a silly hat. You already have the swishy badass coat." John pointed at it accusingly on the coat stand.

Sherlock turned on his heel to look over at it. "You like my coat?"

"I didn't say that. But I need something badass too, like, shades..."

"We live in England. There is no sun here." Sherlock delivered in a perfect deadpan.

"I noticed, Dracula." John matched it.

Sherlock tutted. "I'm only pale because I spend so much time indoors conducting experiments." He waved a hand over the notepad.

"I saw your school pictures. You don't age."

"Genetics."  
>"You don't like people."<br>"People aren't likeable."

"You only go out at night."

"Less people around."

"You don't eat."

"I'm not hungry. Why, do you want to go out?"

"Yeah, now you mention it I am kinda hung- wait a minute! Don't _do_ that! Not to me!"

Sherlock's eyes lit up, "Do what?" Sherlock loved playing mind games, a worrying trait he shared with his brother and Moriarty.

"Trap me like that. With your feigned innocence and your-" he spluttered, "WORDS."

"Would you prefer I converse by interpretive dance?" Sherlock grabbed the skull on the mantelpiece and held it aloft, striking the Hamlet pose.

"I'd probably understand more of your deductions."

Sherlock pouted and dropped the skull to his side.

"Are you implying I'm a poor communicator?"

John facepalmed, smooshing his face with the palm in a mildly massaging manner.

"Christ, no wonder they think we're a couple."

The corner of Sherlock's mouth flickered up, looking down at John in his hedgehog jumper. His head inclined to one side like a curious otter. "Dinner?"

John looked back at the screen, with screensaver bubbles now all over the offending suggestions. "...Fuck it." He closed the laptop. "I'll get my coat."  
>Sherlock grabbed the bottom hem corners of his dressing gown as John passed, jerked them erratically from side to side and said in a sing-song voice "Swishy-swishy!"<br>"Fuck you." John growled.  
>Sherlock fell back on the sofa from cackling so hard.<p> 


	2. Sherlock's secret sojourn to Soho

(Set: After events of s2.e1. and Before s2.e3.)

Sherlock gently shut the door on the Baker residence. The turkey noodles he suggested to John yesterday worked a treat, the typtophan sending him into a long, peaceful sleep.  
>The Tube was relatively quiet, statistically people skip Mondays more than any other day. He amused himself by calculating the mundane details around him: the raindrop which would win the race, the trains which would come in late, nothing was lost on him. Unfortunately, that meant he got bored alot. The dopaminergic pathways in his brain were equally as active as those in any addict, waiting on that next hit of danger and intrigue. He anxiously knitted his fingers in unusual patterns.<p>

He wasn't nervous. He was just apprehensive.

The disguise worked, no one noticed him. Or rather, hooded gentlemen were such a common sight, people were used to pretending they didn't exist. _Ah, children, what an adorable sense of entitlement, the only real respect is for oneself, as adults soon learn. Because everyone leaves, eventually. All you have, the only person who knows your story, is yourself._  
>He blinked, train journeys always inspired a touch of melancholia. And he wouldn't think about John. It wasn't a betrayal, only an omission.<p>

He lied in wait round the back. A barkeep came out for a cigarette. Sherlock, whipping off the hooded garment and throwing it in the opposite as a distraction whooshed past the young guy and in the open door. By the time the man had spun around, there was only a door, which Sherlock locked behind him.

"So..." came the smokey drawl of the female, the only occupant of the entire private club.

"So." Sherlock nodded respectfully and placed a hand on the chair he stood defensively behind.

"You snuck out for me. Like a teenage boy. Hoping to get lucky?"

"Hardly. I'd rather talk."

"Let's hope you're good at oral... communication. Maybe we could cuddle after."

"I have a flatmate, if I want a cuddle I'll use him. Don't you want to speak to me?"

"I'd rather speak to your body. You summoned me here, and like a genie, I am here."

"Magical. My mind is all I need stimulated. Your sexist expectations of mens' demands are disappointing. Good suggestion, by the way. The last place anyone would suspect. A secreted bar behind a sex club, for someone like me."

"Like you? No, I don't believe that. Sex is a subject, you need a good teacher."

"Spoken like a true whore."

The Woman laughed richly. "Only you could get away with that. Offer's alwasy open. I'm ready and willing for your experimentation, Mr Holmes."

"Hardly an exclusive offer."

"It could be." she replied quietly, thoughtfully.

"Shall we get to the business at hand?"

"If you insist," she threw back her head as she rolled her eyes in an evocative display of her neck. _Purposeful. Everything with her. Always deliberate._

"Tell me what I want to know."

"How about I tell you what I _want _you to know?"

"Insufficient. You have my attention, don't waste it."

"Oh," she pouted mischievously. "I know. Do you like my dress? Whodunnit?"

"The woman in the red dress," he glanced at her book on the table, _fleur du mal_, "in the library. Very good."

"I thought you'd like librarians. Intelligent men usually do."

"Distractions. And you could never pass for a librarian. Pelvic mobility too high, sclera capillaries unbroken, upper spinal weakness missing, stride thrice too long and the nails of a lady of leisure."

"For you, I'd never be a lady."

"Such a shame," she blanched a little.

"This should be a limerick," she chimed, "the virgin and the whore."

"A parable of the dangers of wild women? Unoriginal."

"I was thinking a story of redemption."

"Really? Then tell me something, confess a secret, to make you worthy of redeeming."

"Moriarty is currently being held captive by your brother."

Sherlock was taken aback, even Irene noticed the genuine surprise, denoted by an increase in pedal distance. "Go on."

"That is all I know, I swear. But any excuse to see you. How is the one with the rope in the stairwell going? Did he swing by the rafters from choice or from compulsion?"

"It was suicide. To the police. And so it shall remain. He's actually living out the rest of his years in New Zealand with a boyfriend-"

"Boyfriend?"

"Yes, boyfriend, whom he hid from his now widowed wife."

"That's kind of you, to let it rest. A quaver of an unsolved case."

"I know the answer, that's all I care about. A puzzle finitum. The rest is just paperwork. I've answered your questions, respond in kind."

"I don't know anything else."

"Who took him in? When? How long for? On what basis? Where is he being held? Why, why why?"

"The details are undisclosed. I only know because I got sent a text-"

Sherlock snatched the familiar phone. It read: _Off to play with the Iceman at her Majesty's convenience, he's cute when he's hot and bothered, becomes a little Red Queen. Require a little time for my solo project, don't reply. _

"Why send you this?"

"He wanted your number. I didn't tell him. Wanted your brother's too. Gave him it. Keep it in the family. At least his taste is consistent."

"He's planning something. yes, I know you know. Let me think, Woman."

"To ask for both of your numbers, it must involve both of you. If your brother is the easier target, it must be about you."

"How do I know you're not still working for him?"

"With, dearest. I was working with him, don't be sexist." she chided. "He wants me dead, after the password incident. I fail to reciprocate. You do the right thing, which in this case, coincides with my plans. For self-preservation."

"He didn't suspect?"

"No, not at all. It seems he was willing to believe a woman could succumb that easily to a man. As if I'd set it to something silly... god, really..."

"I appreciate it. Resetting it, I mean."

"Oh, don't mention it. Literally. Never again. Once you owned up to losing in front of that delightful fireplace, that was the victory I wanted. I have money, lots of it. Offshore."

"Intelligent people always do."

"Thank you."

"I'm surprised Mycroft fell for it though."

"He wanted to believe you have feelings, romantic attachments. And I was the perfect symbol of the tempting, devilish, wicked woman. Which is ridiculous, considering we hardly knew each other at that point. Now, however... look at you, a man doesn't save a woman when she got caught liberating enslaved courtesans for nothing."

"I agreed with your motives. I needed some new air. London smells better everytime I return."

"Especially the rain."

"Especially... now why is Moriarty after me this time?"

"Seems big, none of my contacts could come up with anything."

"Last time we met, he said he owed me a fall."

"A little obvious, don't you think? I can't imagine him lying in wait in a dark alley with a banana skin."

"I imagine the intellectual kind."

"He can't reduce you to a human level."

"Brain damage? Drugs?"

"No. Perception of your intelligence?"

"Yes. Likelier. He'd need to pull strings. Then again, he is liasing with my dear brother."

"He didn't tell you?"

"No. Nothing."

"Warn him."

"I will. Mycroft is equally as intelligent as me, he just blends in better, put his abilities to a different use: keeping secrets, rather than exposing them."

"Say that again. The exposing part."

"It seems Moriarty wants to expose me for something. But I've done nothing wrong."

"He'll frame you for something."

"I'd best be prepared when he does."

"Come on the run with me, it'll be fun. I'll make sure of it."

"No I must get back to my lifesize teddy bear, he should be waking up anytime soon."

She pouted. They shook hands and parted as equals.

Sherlock sat at the computer (John's) in 221B, minimised a few questionable tabs (one on a Jennifer Lawrence - ex girlfriend?, one on the proper jam to use in a scone and one on gifts "for the man who has everything") and began to research interrogation tactics for Mycroft. He texted Mycroft to arrange a meeting. He must warn him and despite their differences Mycroft did not take kindly to being personally manipulated, and protected family above all else. They'd fix this together, so Moriarty didn't see the recovery from his inevitable fall. _A magic trick has three acts..._

John wandered in yawning and asked why Sherlock was dressed. Sherlock pointed to the newspaper he'd bought and kept reading. John nodded, yawned again and sat down. Some headline about a hospital. "Bloody NHS again, spend-spend-spend. Why do you want to read that?"

"Cartoons."

Mycroft knocked at the door.

(Aware this is not my usual style of humour, too subtle, but those two are naturally restrained around one another. Just wanted to write this missing scene as I imagined it in my head. Feel free to ignore this one.)


	3. Of Scones and Stocks

"Low on sleep?" John ventured. He'd taken a few swigs of morning coffee, before the compulsory tea all real English-folk consumed on a daily basis.

"What makes you say that?" Sherlock had put down the laptop, science news at this time of morning didn't permeate his brain correctly and was scanning the cover of the local paper aimlessly.

"You look paler. Well, either that or you'll unwell. But there's no case on at the mo, so it that were the case you'd have stayed in bed and made me bring you everything like a glorified skivvy."

"I have no idea what you're talking about." John was becoming much too observant at the least convenient times. "You're my much-valued apprentice."

"Robin to your Batman, more like. But if you dare try and truss me up like a prick in green pants and a gimp mask, I'll put the dust covers on all your books on the wrong hardbacks."

"You wouldn't dare! I have a precariously balanced indexing system, like your jars." He smirked as John's face ticked a little. "Besides, you seem to perform your functions perfectly adequately in your country ensembles."

"Adequate? Country? What."

"You're still in training, young Jedi. And your jackets are cut like a sheepherder's. Hardly going to get you a double page in Vogue, but it suits you: reliable, classic, heartwarming."

"I can never tell if you're insulting me or just stating sartorial facts. I see you didn't delete knowledge of the Jedi religion."

"Why would I insult you? You don't do anything worth insulting and you're always there when needed, it's an ideal arrangement." Sherlock was looking down and didn't see the small, warm smile John gave him. "As for the Jedi, I like them. Especially Yoda. And his little green screwed-up face reminds me of Mycroft when you frogmarch him past a bakery."

John laughed, nearly spat out his coffee. "Diet not going well, then?"

"He doesn't need to lose weight, it's a vanity diet. He wants to fit into those suits with the teeny tiny waist." Sherlock made an oval shape by bringing his index fingers and thumbs together and held it up. When their eyes met Sherlock whispered "Sometimes he wears a corset." John had to put down his coffee and take a moment to breathe without getting coffee in the lungs.

"You both follow fashions, though."

"No. I have style. Style is timeless."

"Coco Chanel?"

"Is that who said it?" No recognition flickered through his face.

"Think so. One of my exes was mad about her."

Sherlock _hmph_-ed.

"I blame myself for the waist thing though."

"Why?" John sensed a lot of stories, but Sherlock was rarely in the mood to discuss his younger years. From what he could tell, they were very lonely.

"I persuaded our mother to buy him a barbie doll."

John's coffee mug emblazoned in red with I NEED THERAPY, remained in a curiously awkward position between table and mouth. "You're joking."

"It was an experiment. He did want one, after all."

"Hm, guess it isn't so surprising then. What did you play with, as a kid?"

Sherlock looked up as though as the answer was obvious. "Chemistry sets."

"You still do." John snorted.

A long while of silence passed, as only the closest of friends can enjoy.

_Short. Soft. 2 knocks, hummingbird speed. _

Casual visitor. Female. Familiarity. Slight impatience.

"Come in, Mrs Hudson," Sherlock called.

"I thought I heard the floorboards go. Glad I caught you boys. Have you eaten?"

John had just put the kettle on for the tea, "Er, I haven't. And Kate Moss over there" he pointed to Sherlock, "hasn't touched a thing."

Sherlock kept quiet. It was a difficult habit to undo, ruining surprises.

"Excellent. I just got some scones and cream from the market."

John's eyes lit up, he was almost as bad as Mycroft for sweets and preserves seemed to be his downfall.

He practically skidded to a stop in front of his special cupboard and breathed a sugary sigh at the contents: icing sugars, cake flavourings, cake decorations, gingerbread shapes, and most of the shelves taken up with every flavour of jam known to man. Then again, Sherlock was the same way about tea blends, a fortunate coincidence.

"Someone's prepared" Mrs Hudson observed with a twinkle in her eyes.

"Old army habit. You learn to value to yummy yummy treats. They're like my crack."

Sherlock looked over like a long-suffering husband, "Aren't you forgetting something?"

The others gave him a confused look. Sherlock nodded over at John's kettle.

"Oh! Right. When Sherlock Holmes has to remind me to be polite, it must be bad." Sherlock showed no outward emotion although the barb hit him square in the heart. John started to make the tea, putting out Mrs Hudson's special cup with the painting of the forget-me-nots on it.

"I don't know dear, Sherlock seems softer the longer you live together."

Sherlock looked horrified, secretly pleased but stared intensely out of the window at the gathering clouds. He liked the way they often blanketed London. It was senseless to hate the weather, it was a system refined over millenia. Rain was nature's shower. He was perched with his legs underneath him and feet on the chair cushion again. John had gotten sick of making the joke that he looked like he was going to spring out, swoop down from 221B and stab someone. Games with assassins were a little too obvious for his own taste, but he couldn't criticize John his little hobby. The games helped him deal with the PTSD, especially those battlefield ones.

From the babble of ordinary talk that weaved over to Sherlock's ears, Mrs Hudson mentioned a wobbly shelf and looked surprised when Sherlock volunteered to do it, instead of John. "I don't think that's your thing, Sherlock."

"I like fixing things. And John intended to 'level-up' today." John's eyes flickered to the PlayStation 3 he'd bought with a bonus.

She looked a bit surprised, in a pleasant way. "Alright, then."

They both watched John proudly rattle off the full menu of preserves they had to choose from. Sherlock settled for his default favourite Regal Raspberry, which surprised no one, but Mrs Hudson went for a strange kind of blueberry and acaii John recently had imported.

The mandatory argument about cream or jam first had been settled months previously. Cream first. "Or how could it settle into the scone?" John had said, partially rattled at the mere thought. Regular people were so attached to childhood memories, Sherlock noted. Scones reminded John of picnics as a kid. Sherlock sipped his tea, little milk, two sugars, from his regular black, blue and purple mug in his left hand. He co-ordinated _everything_.

"TV?" Sherlock asked permission when there was a guest. Usually, watching the business news was considered rude. Apparently.

"Go for it" John waved and engaged Mrs Hudson on a detailed discussion of the merits of leather conditioner for winter boots.

Sherlock shifted in his chair and sat on the armrest cushion, back draping over comfortably onto the other one.

"A busy day for STEM today as Tony Stark calls a press conference and has a nervous breakdown, live on camera. The Stark Enterprises stock values plummeted amid fears persistent alcoholism has ruined the legacy of his father Howard. Again, SIA stock fell by 2170 points today, and if you're just joining us you can join the debate online, is this the end of the Stark legacy? Over to..."

Sherlock got a text. Mycroft.  
>"SIA: buy or sell?"<p>

Sherlock rarely got involved in personal finance affairs, it seemed easy to predict the outcomes and Mycroft maintained a good portfolio on his behalf. The STEM market always held his attention, though. All those new gadgets, a few came in useful on a case.

"BUY. BUY ALL YOU CAN. SH."

Sherlock knew a long dark night of the soul when he saw one. But geniuses are phoenixes, they rise again in a blaze of glory unscathed for their pains. Thankfully, only his brother had been present at Sherlock's own personal nightmare and that was long forgotten now.

Moriarty's words came back to him. A fall. He was no angel, but by God he still had the wings.

He looked over at Mrs Hudson and John. How happy they were in their own little world, now onto discussing if orange is a colour or a fruit first. What he wouldn't give sometimes to be normal, to be that happy in the simplest things.  
>He turned back to the television, not really watching it but not wanting to cut their conversation short. He knew it was a fruit first. <em>No need to ruin it for them.<em>


	4. The Greatness of Sherlock

John sat down calmly after seeing Mrs Hudson out and chatting all the way on the stairs. _Funny how attached normal people seem to one another and they don't even realize it. _

"You've been watching the news a lot lately. Something I need to know?"

"Hardly. Have you heard about Tony Stark? Nervous breakdown, they think."

"And what do you think?"

"He's the only man who could be louder than a Hawaiian shirt without saying a word. They underestimate him. Go big or go home is practically his motto. He'll pull through or die trying."

"He'll go out in fireworks. Showoff."

"Jealous?"

"He's got everything, of course I am."

"A man with everything except someone to love him."

"Everyone loves him."

"Ah, but from that pedestal he's on, he can't see it."

"Sherlock, you do see the parallel? Genius, cut off from the world?"

"Hm... we don't choose it, John. It's lonely on the outside. We observe humanity. We are Others. Not a part of the great wheel. I use my abilities certainly, but I never asked for this."

"Here you go, Adam Jensen."

"Who?"

"Patient I met. Former soldier. Needed counseling. So fucked up. Conspiracy theorist. Now in some asylum cos he built some imaginary world and decided never to leave." John paused. "Don't become like that, Sherlock."

"Oh don't be silly, of course I won't. I'm no American. I'm English. I like tea and the Queen. English people love complaining about reality, why would I leave that behind?"

"You knew he was American?"

"You said asylum. Not institution. Subconscious switch of interpretive repertoires based on one's subject triggered by empathic response."

"Tea?"

"Please" he waved a hand.

"Tea-making is a really gay superpower, isn't it?"

"Nonsense, in this country it puts you right up there with Stephen Fry. We should include it in the Olympics."

"I'm nothing compared to your abilities, and you're so... laissez-faire about it all."

"There you go again, with the negative self-talk. Your therapist would not approve."

"You're my therapist now?"

"I'm your flatmate; I'm your everything."

John laughed. "Wise words, Young Master."

"Wisdom is the use of one's power. I am not afraid of my power, as many others are." He looked John up and down pointedly. "That is why I'm unique. I am wise and powerful. That is why they fear me."

"Fine line between irritation and fear."

"Irritation and frustrations are both sublimated manifestations of threat. People sense what I am, John. Just like they sense how calm you are in a crisis."

"We're out of milk."

"Case in point."

"The mystery of the missing milk?"

"The Great Sherlock Holmes is on the case!" He pointed at the ceiling.

"No one calls you that."

"I call me that."

"One person calls you that."

"That's a start."

John smiled wryly at his flatmate. "Trip to the shops?"

"A quest! March onward, captain!"

_The Great Sherlock Holmes_, John thought. _He does crazy with a side order of cute._

Sherlock mused simultaneously.

_Funny how attached I'm becoming to him. Am I becoming normal? God, I hope not. You'll be the death of me_, _John Watson._


	5. Tell me about your Brother

A gale blew outside to meet them at the front door. Sherlock pulled his coat tighter around him with one hand and John closer with the other.

"Do you think it's worth going for a full shop, Sherlock?"

"There are two of us to carry everything but no. Better go day after tomorrow, when the weather's finer."

"I won't even ask how you know that."

"Magic." The glint in Sherlock's eye almost inclined John to believe him.

John smiled, which turned into a grimace. "I'm going to need that back, you know."

"What? What back?"

"My back." John nodded his head to Sherlock's arm around him.

"Oh. Does it bother you?"

"Er... not exactly. But some blokes down the army pub have talked, spread a few rumours." John looked away, an unconscious gesture of shame Sherlock picked up on and didn't interrupt. "Seeing you hold me like this doesn't help, mate."

Sherlock dropped his arm from its protective grip with a tinge of sadness in his face. He was pacified that John couldn't see it as his hair curled around his face in the wind. "Just didn't want you to blow away" he added cheerily, acting perfectly uncaring to the request. John's laugh, quiet on the wind, covered over the scar; just a little thing, but Sherlock was used to scars by this point in his life. Genius comes at a great price to acceptance. The years bring a cloak of darkness from the natural isolation from ordinary humans. Sherlock subconsciously swathed his own cloak, that big, protective coat, more tightly around himself. All the better to hold the feelings in.

John punctuated the long silence as he strode to keep up with Sherlock with a uncanny observation. "If what you do is magic, what does that make you?"

"I'm a magician. Most of my work goes unseen, which makes the visible results all the more impressive to the audience. Of course, I'd be nothing without my assistant."

"I prefer the term apprentice." John bit his lip. "What does that make Mycroft?"

Sherlock's elastic face took on a tone of mock innocence. "Derren Brown?"

John had to cower in a doorway to recover from the stitches in his side from laughing. "Sorry, I could just imagine the trolling necessary for that job, he'd be brilliant! Just wicked!"

"Mycroft, my... brother, keeps secrets none of the plain clothed people could imagine. I uncover the darkest recesses of human ability to cause harm that none would like to imagine. The sibling rivalry was dragged out into parallel careers. He maintains order, in the government no less. I thrive on the chaos of crime."

"You both want justice."

"Oh, no. Mycroft has no such ideals. He's Machiavellian. He wants the puppet strings of the nation to dance to his tune, a pied piper of ideas. Brilliant ideas, but I have a distaste for brainwashing in any form. to submit is the characteristic of weaker minds. I do not pretend to be ordinary, I disdain the normal way of things. Order bores me. He was always telling me what to do as children, moreso than Mother."

"Sounds like a big issue." John looks awkward he'd ever brought it up.

"A big throbbing nerve to tickle, yes."

"Throbbing?" John hooked an eyebrow up.

"Ongoing. The disease lives on."

"That's a bit harsh, Sherlock-"

"No." Sherlock stopped walking and put a hand up to John's face. "Don't do that. Don't presume things about my childhood and history with my brother. You have no idea what he's like. He'll as soon protect family as turn around and sting them. Even now, he has that controlling complex. He owns Scotland Yard. His reach is impossible to escape."

"You seem to have done pretty well out of his meddling."

"You can only spring up when you've been pushed down."

"You're a Jack in a Box?"

"I'm a coiled and caged animal. Anderson's distrust of me is a valid intuition, like the lower lifeform he is, he senses the danger. If I couldn't solve crimes, I'd probably be the cause of them."

"What like a Kingpin?" John laughed, imagining Sherlock in a massive fur coat.

"The night to Mycroft's day. He would try to preserve this country. I would seek to destroy it."

John shrunk a little from Sherlock's side. He wasn't pretending.

Sherlock turned his head toward John. "Do I scare you?"

"There's such a thing as too honest."

Sherlock's shoulders slumped. They carried on walking, past the shop they intended to go in initially. John followed Sherlock. He stopped beside the Thames, peering into the grey waters with a middle distance stare.

"Why are you two always at odds?"

"To Mycroft, I started it by being born. Mother was a forgetful thing, so he'd be left to look after me. A resentment naturally grew."

"You've never mentioned your father either."

"He was unreliable. Mycroft hated him and took it out on me."

"That must've been tough."

"Not really. I was bright even then. Anger is a form of passion, a sign that he cared. I'd have been more worried if he'd been apathetic toward me. But he always cared, even if the way it manifested sometimes screwed me something royal. I chose the other path. I was boisterous and curious, doing experiments in the garden all summer instead of playing and the cynicism life has caused in me has led to the fortunate application of my talents. I was ignored, left to my own devices whenever Mycroft wasn't around, doing his internship at Parliament. It was a calm time, most of the time."

"What did your father do? Walk out like most of them these days?"

"Yes, he walked out. It was the only good deed he ever did us." Sherlock looked up at him. John had a gruff expression of a soldier, his face betrayed the lines of a man who'd seen carnage. He understood hardship. Sherlock looked back at the lightly lapping waves, the colour of doves and ash in this greyscale country.

He drew in a rattling breath as the saliva clogged his throat somewhat. He needed to say it.

"My father was a killer."

Sherlock heard the steep intake of breath but didn't look up. He couldn't look up. He couldn't bring himself to see the impression the information bore on John's face, the image that would be burned into his eidetic memory forevermore if he did.

John felled onto the Victorian railings in his peripheral vision. After a pregnant moment, he tentatively put a hand on Sherlock's shoulder and squeezed gently.

A measured voice chimed lowly from between barely parted lips, "No one must know."

John nodded and pursed his lips, "No one must know."

"Go back to the flat John. I'll get the milk this time."

John dropped his hand from the towering figure of his flatmate with regret. He observed the deliberately blank expression on Sherlock's face, so he turned and walked away, looking back every few feet until he rounded a corner.

Sherlock looked skyward to the seagulls. His eyes settled on a few crows. The truth was always such a great source of pain. To share it was a burden, but one he knew John would have wanted to take on. What an unusual and splendid example of manhood Sherlock had for a flatmate.

Those weren't the tiniest blossomings of tears in Sherlock's eyes, it was just the wind.


	6. By the River

A gale blew Sherlock's coat into twisted silhouettes. He stood swamped by memories without calculation. The emotion disgusted him. The hardened glint of his eyes turned to flint as he sensed his brother approach. His entire body tensed, a lithe alert program primed for anticipated conflict. A light clack of an umbrella meandered and echoed as the weather settled into an encroaching mist pillowing the vast city like Olympia.

"You've been standing there for nigh on half an hour, brother. I've never known you to be indecisive before. If you're going to drown yourself, best give me your phone first so I can call your loved ones." Sherlock's eyebrows twitched at the provocation in the comedic pause. "Oh wait, you have nobody. Only I am loyal enough as blood to put up with you."

"At least I could starve out here, if I waited long enough. You can't boast that one, _brother._" Sherlock recited a line in monotone he knew by heart, "But in the end, one needs more courage to live than to kill himself."

"Camus?" Mycroft ventured.

"Yes, Camus." Sherlock stripped the gloves from his hands and stuffed them into his pocket. He breathed in deeply that chill air and a hint of the mystery of the mist. The pads of his fingers gently rested on the iron railings. The smell rose once he'd paid it heed and the cold was refreshing when taken after the sweat and heat of anger. "Do you know what he meant by it?"

"Why venture my opinion when yours is forthcoming? No doubt your romantic childishness will resurface in the interpretation." Mycroft was remembering the months on end Sherlock would do nothing but read poetry, gaze at paintings and watch at the theatre, enraptured as though he had seen something divine. Then he lashed out and repeated a deadpan sarcastic line to Sherlock he'd been saying to him since childhood, "What's it like? It must be so difficult for you, to know everything."

"Yes." Sherlock's fingers pressed slowly harder onto the railing until the blood left them. "The Sight nature afforded me is a beautiful pain to bear." Mycroft grunted and hooked his umbrella handle over the railing to the right of Sherlock, and held the umbrella so as to bear his entire body weight. He swayed slightly, teetering on his toes, like a human pendulum. It was a trick he'd been doing out of boredom since childhood and Sherlock continued. "Camus recognized that beauty is a distraction. It is the light before we are blinded. It is, if you want to get technical about it, unreal. A figment of the mind." Mycroft looked up at the last, darkly curious. "To live in this world is to experience its pain, only people like us See it without its veil, a Havi-sham bride enrobed in a delusion which may, once, been truly beautiful."

"Feeling." Mycroft spat the word with a malice his political friends were never privy to hear. "A delusion of the body made to control the mind, my boy. Give me calculation. Give me reason. Give me power."

"Power? You seem confident you know what power is, considering your formal rank."

"The powerful are not confident. They might act it to lure the meek, but inside they are cold. The honestly confident are not powerful, they're warm and weakened, like swords in a furnace."

Sherlock closed his hands around the rails. "It's not like you to visit me without the promise of warm tea."

"My owls reported you left your flat with your new acquisition in high spirits but only he returned, sober and in low ones. Care to explain?"

"No. This time is no exception. Stay out of my affairs."

"Make me." He fully enunciated the words, rolling the 'm's.

"We are men now, we should have stopped this nonsense years ago."

"Why? We're normal in no other capacity, why this? Is your new business deserving of an exception?" Mycroft mouth twisted up into a mild grimace.

"I don't know what you mean."

"Our family is capable of great achievement or great depravity. The summit of a mountain or the mud of a valley. Our reputation joins us to one another. I will not be dragged down by you. Your intensity allows only so much freedom of movement."

"Intensity? Bullshit."

"Oh? So you _don't_ find yourself swinging between manic obsession and craven boredom?"

"An ice monster has no right to pass judgement on what feelings you only see from afar. Get back to your mountain, with the other yeti."

"Sweet but clingy. Cute but broken. I read his therapist's notes. Stay away from your soldier. He's no good to anyone."

"You're only pissed because he won't follow your orders."

"Others will. Others who might remove him from our company by force."

Acting in a blink, Sherlock yanked the umbrella sharply from Mycroft, who fell back and flipped back up to a standing position, dusting down his suit. Sherlock weld the umbrella in swift defensive arcs before holding it at his side in defensive repose, as a weapon. Mycroft kept a slight distance at the threat.

"Protective of your new pet, I see."

"Harm him, and mark my words, Mycroft, I will harm you and I don't care what it does to Mother."

Mycroft reached out expectantly for his umbrella back.

Sherlock swung it around until the point was at Mycroft's throat, where it had abruptly stopped mid-swing. Sherlock leaned forward on the balls of his feet. "The soldier stays with me." A second lapsed and Sherlock pulled back the umbrella, flipped it over with one hand and held out the handle to Mycroft, who took it unimpressed and without flair.

"Very well. For now, the pet is your responsibility. You protect him. You play with him however you like." Mycroft began to walk away and stopped a few yards off. "Well? Chop chop, pumpkin. I'm driving you home to your Prince Charming."

In the car Mycroft directed the driver to 221B Baker Street. Sherlock interrupted, he needed to get some basics first.

"Alright, a brief detour first. What's it like to have ordinary, quaint problems?"

Sherlock grinned "Really nice, actually." Sherlock was in and out of the small corner shop in a couple of minutes. He knew the layout of the aisles and shelves from memory and had two bagfuls by the time he'd left. Mycroft crinkled his nose at the menial homeliness as he placed them on the floor of his car but commented no further.

Mycroft alighted the car with Sherlock and unlocked the front door for him. Sherlock carried both bags with light feet and knew Mycroft always had keys of his living quarters made. It was useless to protest the fact. Mycroft made a friendly appearance in the living room only to make a statement. After brief exchanges of pleasantry he left with words ominous to Sherlock but harmless to John "Stay out of trouble, boys."

John smiled at that as he left.

Mycroft sat in the car with a face of stone. There were none to act for anymore as he was driven from 221B.

Sherlock found his companion had stood up and began to help him unpack the shopping. It was a mild conciliatory gesture which appeased Sherlock. He'd been accepted. It seems they were to say no more about it for now, but the silence between them had yet to be broken, as only Mycroft and John had spoken when he'd returned.

When John had closed the fridge door on the unpacked shopping, Sherlock pulled off his scarf, having forgotten it was there until that moment.

"Ah! I hate you." John gestured wildly with his hands. "I hate you. Your hair always looks so perfect. Like it's been blown dry by the breath of angels." He walked over to the counter running his fingers through his own. "If only mine could do that."

Sherlock smiled and chuckled a little.

Balance within chaos was restored in 221B.


	7. Sherlock bored, explains skull painting

Sherlock had woken up early again. He glugged orange juice and devoured toast as a distraction. Today was different. Like his youth. Nothing could sate him. Something was bothering him, but he couldn't deduce himself. The carriage clock resounded with wasted time.

Sherlock tapped his feet, hands grasping the scrolled arms of his chair like a vice. The tapping got faster. The silent pained face gruffly sighed and leapt up. He looked around the room. Nothing beckoned to be picked up. He looked out of the window. Nature was along on its merry way. Birds sang and trees displayed emerald flecks of leaves. Sherlock slammed the window open. He peered out, gripped the frame and extended his own frame dangerously far out. He craned his head and looked around. He deftly flicked his arms up and back into the flat, rocking on his heels. He paced. He paced different courses around the rooms. He stopped at John's bedroom. The door was slightly ajar, as it always was. He couldn't bother John. He stopped at the front door. He couldn't leave the flat. Too many people, too much _stupidity_. Answers everywhere he looked, to questions he didn't care about. Every day the same. He pounded the door with a fist. The impact bang shook the door. Sherlock placed a flat palm on it to cease the movement. He launched up the stairs, running on all fours and hovered over his desk. He wanted to throw the contents to the ground, but some of the belongings were John's, so he resisted.

John emerged from his cave of a room, yawning as he said "Yerro" and half-heartedly waved. He started to shuffle over to the kitchen. Sherlock turned and pointed at John.

"You" he barked.

"Eh? Me?"

"You."

They stared at one another, John blearily as he yawned again.

"What are you doing up this early, hm?" Sherlock grimaced. "Hiding something? Planning something? Doing something?" Sherlock strode up to the listless form and leaned over into his face. "Hm? HMMM?" Sherlock froze for an answer.

John yawned. "You're in one of your moods again."

"Moods? What moods? I'm not in a mood."

"Sure you're not Sherlock. Don't mind me." John walked into the kitchen.

"What moods?" Sherlock shouted over.

"Oy, don't be too loud, you'll wake up Mrs Hudson."

"What moods?" Sherlock whispered visciously.

John looked out at Sherlock and put up a finger. Sherlock angrily marched into the kitchen, measuring every step. John turned to look at him, sipping a coffee from Sherlock's machine.

"Ahh." He savoured the coffee and swished a little in his mouth before swallowing. "Ok. I'm ready." John smiled pleasantly.

"For what."

"The mood. Bring it."

"I'm not in a _mood_."

"You're fully dressed, well-kempt for once, and from the completed washing up you've been awake for a while now."

"Don't do that."

"What?"

"Deduce me."

"Why? You do it to everyone else."

"It's different when I do it."

"Sure it is."

"What." Sherlock asked tetchily.

"What." John replied calmly.

Sherlock threw his arms in the air. "Enough. I'm…. argh!"

John drank more coffee. "One of those days, huh?"

"I don't know what I am!"

"I do."

"What? Do enlighten me with your blogging veteran intellect."

"I read about this, it's a mixed episode."

Sherlock's eyes widened, nostrils flared and lips thinned. He drew himself up to full height from a slump but John didn't move a muscle.

"Are you calling me bipolar?"

"I'm calling this" John pointed up at Sherlock "a mixed episode."

"There's nothing wrong with me."

"Says what? Reason? What are your feelings telling you?"

"Feelings don't matter."

"You're a slave to yours - right now." John poked Sherlock's chest jokily.

"There's nothing wrong with me. I've been tested." Sherlock replied testily.

"Oh sure, you were tested, but those things are easy to fool. A clever clogs like you would have no trouble."

"And why would I do that?"

"Because you're too proud to admit it when something's wrong."

"Nothing's wrong" Sherlock growled.

"Then what's going on." John grinned tauntingly.

"I'm…" Sherlock searched his lexicon for a suitable word, but his growing anger was blotting out his rational mind like smog, "BORED."

"You shouldn't be. You've got a to-do list the size of, well, you." John looked Sherlock up and down.

"It's not that, it's-" Sherlock placed his palms together, at his mouth to suppress incoherent thoughts. The wind from the window blew his hair around his face menacingly. "The existentialism in ennui. Even thinking is boring me." His hands spread and flailed out.

"Let me guess. You've got all this energy and can't find anything to do with it."

"Exactly!"

"That's a mixed episode."

Sherlock folded his arms and dropped into his chair.

John perched himself comfortably, standing behind his own chair. "Maybe you should see a Doctor."

"Maybe you should see tomorrow." Sherlock sulked.

"Is that a threat?"

"It's whatever you want it to be" Sherlock shrugged.

"What do you want to do?"

"Nothing. Something."

"You don't know do you?"

"No!"

"But Sherlock Holmes nev-er admits when he doesn't know something, so we're just going to sit here then are we? Until you've stopped sulking?"

Sherlock reached over for a blanket and threw it over his head. "Go away."

John said nothing.

"Are you still there?"

John said nothing.

"…John?"

"I thought you wanted me to go away."

"Argh!" Sherlock stood up, like a Halloween ghost and went to his room, arms outstretched so he didn't hit a wall on the way.

Sherlock emerged again about an hour later, as John was reading the paper. Sherlock pulled it out of his hands and threw it out the window. A car horn blared.

"I was reading that!"

"And now you're not."

"You're never happy."

Sherlock scoffed. "I should hope not! Contentment is the beginning of the end. The higher mind needs purpose to thrive. That's why the elderly often die within months of retirement. Without a strong mind fixed on the horizon, the promise of something more, the body withers."

"And what's your purpose, oh great one?"

"I'm still figuring that one out."

"Which means you don't know."

"It doesn't mean I don't know, it just means that I haven't figured it out yet."

"Dunno."

"Yet."

"Not a fuckin' clue." John drew out the words and smiled.

"Don't you tell me about clues, Mister" Sherlock nodded to the smiley face on the wall.

"Are you ever not focused? Didn't you play with toys as a kid?"

"Somewhat. But I preferred to toy with the nannies. Poor dears, never lasted very long."

"Didn't you ever, you know, switch off? Be a kid?"

"I don't switch off, I have a sleep mode."

"How can you do that? Isn't it tiring?"

"What? No!" Sherlock put down like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "It's the only life worth living" his words and face saddened as he finished the sentence.

"That makes no sense, you know."

"You make no sense."

"I'm normal, I'm not supposed to make sense. You're the freak."

"Ouch."

"C'mon, you think it."

"Yes, but you said it."

"How do you understand criminals and not normal people?"

"They're predictable. And I do understand normal people, the reasons, I just don't agree with them."

"There isn't an opt-in terms and conditions for humanity, Sherlock." He was ignored.

"I have been trying this attribution technique lately. If it makes no sense, I assume normal people think that way."

"So you're turning normal? That's why you're bothered? That's insulting."

"That's heuristics."

"Alright. Explain the skull on the wall."

"That's art."

"What's it meant to be?"

"It's me."

"You?"

"Yes, a self-portrait. In depth. Deep down."

"Okay, first how and second why? But especially why."

"First, structural MRI. Second, thought it might be nice. Brightens up the room."

"A nice skull? Not a flower or a landscape or heaven _forbid_ a naked lady."

Sherlock sat at the table and John winced at the screech on the floor.

"I wanted a painting. A personal one. Hence, a self-portrait seemed the obvious choice. But looks change with age, I wanted something unusual. We decay into our true face anyway, and I do like my skull arrangement most out of all my bones." Sherlock mused.

"I'm afraid to ask."

"Because it houses this brain." His fingers rested on his temples.

"I don't know what I expected from that answer. On one hand, not narcissistic and on the other, so much…"

"It's modern art, John. That's always subjective and open to interpretation."

"I don't know what to think."

"Welcome to the club."


	8. Reverse psychology and identity

John was reading a medical journal and throwing out comments on the contents. He started on an article on elective surgeries.

"No-no-no-no," Sherlock said as one string, "you don't want to do that."

"Do what?"

"I've had this discussion many times before, and it's always ended the same."

"How?"

"I win. I always win. They end up recoursing to the way they _feel_, the weakest and final form of argument, as though the slightest of emotional outpourings indicate a wise decision."

"But-"

"No. There is nothing to be gained. You will not persuade me, and I haven't the time to change other's opinions one by one. I have better things to do. So let's just leave it, shall we?" Sherlock opened a book on the properties of steel and flicked to the contents page.

"It's exactly the same."

Sherlock looked up sternly and hardly moved, making a visible effort to keep his tone measured but firm.

"No, it's not. When you bring medicine, the bastion of normative health, and further, surgery into a discussion, the entire thing shifts away from liberty into a thick, syrupy ethical quandary, whose only resolution and _believe me_ I have thought about it _at length_, is denial. Let them pay for it themselves, not burden the taxpayer on an ethical quagmire, whose core argument is flimsy feeling."

"But they want to be different, it isn't their fault how they were born."

"If I wanted to be a unicorn, would surgically grafting a horn to my forehead make it so?"

"That's not the same."

"Of course it's not." Sherlock went back to his book.

"It'd make you a dickhead."

"Welcome to the real world, Neo." Sherlock chimed from beyond the book. "Don't judge a book by its cover. Switching out covers doesn't alter the substance of the pages. I act like a dick, that's my cover, my dust protection." He strummed his long fingers over the book he was holding.

"Dickhead."

"For all the world to see."

John read the rest of the journal in fuming silence, like a man-shaped kettle.

Sherlock pondered renting steel joining equipment. He came to the conclusion it probably wouldn't fit in the flat.

"Other people need consideration too, you know." John handed Sherlock a teacup with a biscuit slanted on the saucer.

"All I do is in service to other people."

John balked.

"You don't believe me."

"No."

"I could work in stock, and play the markets. I could work in government, and spy and lie to people. But I don't. That was rhetorical."

"Mine was too."

"You can't tiptoe around other's feelings. It does nothing to help in the long run."

"Who are you to tell other people how to live their lives?"

"A genius. Hence, better equipped, actually."

"Robot. You're just a robot." John did the dance quickly.

"Machines can have feelings. Haven't you seen AI? I cried at that film."

John did a double take. "I thought you cried at Titanic?"

"Ah, that time at the inaccuracies."

"You're always right in there, so quick to criticise. Where do you get off? Yeah, you're smart. But intelligence isn't everything."

"Only stupid people think that. The point of intelligence, the measurement, is problem solving."

"Some problems can't be solved with intelligence!" John shouted. "They're NOT reducible to maths or science or whatever else goes on in that head! People are MORE than that!"

Sherlock surveyed John from over the lip of his teacup. A small silence passed.

_Or so they like to believe_, Sherlock thought. _You're the heart of this friendship._ "This isn't about me," he said calmly and blew softly on his tea to cool it.

"Exactly!"

"This is about you."

"No, no, wait, don't even go there."

"I see your therapy is going well."

"Ad, ada, ado, adhomo, ad hominem! That's what this is."

"I do not attack you, I'm trying to help you."

"Patronising bastard."

"Always. I thought this wasn't about me? Vis a vis, you."

"There's nothing wrong with me."

"Why are you acting like there is?"

"I'm not acting anything."

"You're angry."

"You're making me angry."

"I make you nothing other than you are. 'He who angers you conquers you.' You are choosing to be angered."

"Really? And what do you suggest we do about it?"

"Have you tried soul searching?"

"No" John answered indignant.

"Why not? Even I have a soul, John."

"Sherlock! I know you like all this introspection crap but sorry it's just not for me."

"Bullshit."

"What?"

"You heard me. Everyone wants to know more about themselves, it's a natural human egotism. Something is overriding that. You're scared."

"I'm not scared and this reverse psychology crap won't work on me."

"Isn't mentioning reverse psychology in the hopes of a U turn, a reverse psychology tactic in itself?"

"Stop it." John pointed and caught Sherlock's eye.

Sherlock's eyes lit up. "What?"

"That mindfuck thing. I know it. I know you're doing it. I can see it in your eyes."

"How romantic. However, the distraction has failed."

"What possible reason is there to indulge your experimental whims, huh? As if my mind wasn't ripped up enough."

"Exactly my point. Your therapist can only help you see the problems, they can't solve the puzzle for you. Living here has been a distraction, but the day will come when you have none, and then what? What will you do?"

"You'll help me through it then, then."

Sherlock shuddered at the grammar. "John, I won't be around forever. You can't count on that."

"I shot someone for you, if you try to leave your long back will make an easy target."

"Flattery won't get you out of this one, Captain Obvious."

"I thought you said identity isn't a real thing? I remember you saying that."

"You have a good memory. Yes, I think that. Multiplicity, Mischel's situationalism, identity is a convenient collection of schemata, like a filing cabinet."

"Then how do you solve a puzzle with pieces from tons of different games? You're not making much sense, Sherlock."

"That's because I _haven't explained myself yet_." Sherlock enunciated with a cold venom.

John spread out his arms and dropped them on his armrests. "I'm waiting, bitch."

Sherlock stood on his seat. "Very well."

"Bring it."

"Deduce it?"

"Work it. Work that sexy brain."

Sherlock pulled a face. John explained.

"If you're comparing it to a muscle, you- nevermind."

Sherlock held his hands together and fell forward for a moment sniggering. When he bolted back up he was entirely composed. "Suitable metaphor. As I was saying, there is a strange paradox in fearing one's mind."

"What is it with you and paradoxes?"

"They're all around, like traffic jams. Please shut up."

"Fine." John rested his face on an open hand.

"Most people are naturally hesitant to explore the limitations of their own mind. The reasons are twofold: one – they're afraid they'll be disappointed and two – they might fuck something up or be fucked up by something they find. The wise overcome this by realizing the mind needs to be exercised and tested just like the body. This illusion implies a quantum outcome that observing the mind will fundamentally and unalterably change it. This is wrong. The mind can only be improved by observation and only one person too, the user, may do it, or in fact, is qualified to do it."

"Right… so introspection = good. Got it."

"Let me finish."

"Uhuh."

"Mirage. Are you familiar with the concept of a mirage?"

"Yes, but I thought you wanted me to 'let you finish'?"

"I did. But while you were talking I thought of a different, better way to explain."

"Talking?"

"Talking."

"All I said was uhuh."

"Uhuh."

"Yeah, I know what a mirage is."

"Well, most people's Self concept is a mirage. They think they know what it is without really looking. This enforces the illusion because if you don't explore yourself-"

"Kinky."

"Settle down. If you don't explore your Self, it will continue to be a mirage, because we're not born with a developed sense of identity, the idea we have one is a ghost until we flesh it out."

"Suitable metaphor."

Sherlock nodded quaintly. "But the mirage only exists from afar. If you near it, if you see it dissolve on approach, you yourself can build something real in its place, and that real identity is always preferable to a mirage."

"Except for the two fears."

"You can build it up properly." Sherlock smiled warmly. It didn't suit him.

"I'm not sure."

"Do you trust me?"

"I hope so."

"So do I. Let's get started. Tell me, in detail, everything about your last army tour. We'll work backwards from there."

John talked for hours, staring at his cooling tea all the while. At times it shook with fear and Sherlock covered John's quaking hand with his own. Sherlock spoke little, to ask questions in a neutral tone.

Sherlock realized this was a large project he was taking on, except John had saved his life before. He felt John deserved help rebuilding his own.

Author's Note#1: This is an ongoing fic because Sherlock is immortal. I will never discount the possibility of writing more as long as I live because the character is timeless, and were I able to make a Victorian Sherlock relatable and do the time period any justice I'd have written him in that time too (although I have a one-shot fic on here with RDJ's). As it is, I only know modern London. If you want closure and an ending, you won't find it here. Order of business #2: I write this as a combination of humour and friendship, but I find the greatest friendships are tested by occasional times of confession and heartache. I hope I balance them out at a ratio of around at least 3:1 humour to sadtimes. #3: I will not only include multiple in-show characters, but also Moran (headcanon Michael Fassbender in Hex) just because, I also reserve the right to bring in other fandoms, when I deem appropriate. This includes Tony Stark, as seen already, The Doctor (10th), and whoever else I feel like. #4: Reviews keep me going. I greatly appreciate and read all of them and endeavor to bring in suggestions for topics again, when appropriate. #5: A few have asked about my inspiration in private messages. If I'm honest, I mostly write down real conversations I've had, hence the small time delay between chapters as I *shudder* socialize.


	9. Politics

John's attention strayed from a documentary on banking regulation. He'd only been watching it in case they mentioned war pensions. He switched it off. Sherlock was leafing through piles of paperwork, they shuddered like a wafer thin edition of Jenga.

"What political party are you with?"

"The correct one."

"Seriously, though."

"The naming of a party only reflects one's economic sensibilities. Do we stay with the current system" he raised one hand, "or overhaul it based on a different philosophy of mankind?" and balanced it in the air with the other hand. "But aside from economics, there is much about the country I would like to change. Red tapes burned." His hands dropped and eyes twinkled at the idea.

"So, economically what are you?"

"Conservative. The current capitalist model is the best of all workable ones if competition is king. I would tweak and alter many non-economic forms of governance, though, in those regards I'm thoroughly independent."

"What's Mycroft?"

Sherlock looked over, puzzled. "He lives in North London, take a guess."

"I need a bit more proof than a postcode."

"How many aspects of government do you see him trying to overhaul?"

"None." John sighed. "Conservative, then."

"Born and bred." Sherlock threw the Union Jack cushion from the sofa at John's head.

John's soldier reflex training kicked in and he caught it in front of his face. "What did you want to be when you grew up?"

"Adopted."

John went back to watching the television.

"John, why are you so interested in my background all of a sudden? If you're filling out an online dating profile for me I will shoot you. In the foot."

"I wouldn't dare. If you did require my assistance however, I am a hit with the ladies." He smirked.

"I suppose such a specialization could come in useful at times. I prefer mine more technical. I'm a world expert in interrogation."

"Hm? Who died?"

"Anyone who wouldn't talk." Sherlock met John's look as he spun around, and couldn't keep a straight face for long.

"What was your first case?"

"Jack the Ripper."

"Aw, really?" John leant forward in his chair.

"Yes, really."

"Whodunnit, I've always wanted to know."

"Aaron Kosminski. Temped at a butchers', hated women. I figured he must've blackmailed someone to assist in hiding him, but with the shoddy state of record-keeping in Victorian London combined with the destruction of the scenes that player will forever remain a mystery."

John's mouth was open a little for a few seconds. He remembered himself and pressed his lips together. "I've always wondered about you... " he shook his head, "so many things..."

"Like what? You live with me, thus you know me better than anyone else in the world, whom I'm not a blood relative to of course."

"Of course. I can't remember offhand all the questions, they'll come to me, over time I guess. Do you have any questions for me, or do you see everything about me instantaneously?"

"There'll always be time, John." He patted his shoulder. "To ask me anything you like. My eyes don't see, they absorb. Patterns, specifically. Yet I confess I cannot see very far into the past, you'll have to tell me for yourself."

"Why the limitation?"

"The patterns mesh over one another, like scribbles on a page, it becomes indecipherable."

"No questions for me?"

"What did **_you_** want to be when you grew up?"

"Superman."

Sherlock smiled warmly. "Close enough."

"Missing in one crucial respect." John looked at the floor.

"Flying? I'd like to fly." Sherlock looked at the ceiling, imagining the blue skies. "My long overcoat feels like a cape on blustery days."

"Superman saves everyone. It's impossible. You can't save everyone."

"It isn't one person's job to save everyone, that's the 'super' in hero, John." Sherlock briskly strode to make them some tea. The only thing capable of calming John down when he considered his battle biography was tea served with company.

"We should try." John's eyes welled up, barely perceptible.

"Naturally, yes. That's what good people do, listen to the angel on their shoulder." Sherlock passed John his tea to his dominant right hand. His non-dominant hand got shaky at times like this.

"Have you ever failed?"

Sherlock halted mid-step. He considered lying. He considered throwing a quip. He considered a barb. He considered these to be incorrect replies. "Yes" he said quietly. "As with every game, life we can only play the best hand we are given by circumstance."

"I've never understood how you got by without me."

"It was awful."

"No don't make stuff up, I need to hear your genuine thoughts." John sipped at his tea and collected his disparate thoughts.

"For instance, how can you be self-sufficient, independent to the point of - whatever you are, yet..."

"Go on." Sherlock sat, a finger resting on his teacup's handle.

"I've seen the way normal people react to you. You don't hide what you are. How can you** _do_** that? Doesn't it hurt, to wear your true nature on your sleeve? God," he laughed nervously, "if I was honest about what's happened to me over the years, if I could drop that cheery act I do to pretend everything is okay, I couldn't stand the slightest insult. It'd break me." He gulped tea.

"Loneliness was good. It was a constant reminder, there was no one I could **hurt**. Simply put, I'm a Social Darwinist."

"The perspective whose slogan might as well be 'fuck other people; every man for himself?'"

"Precisely. It's a shell and my particular shell reflects my true intellect ..but not my personality, as you've seen. Only a few people in the world know my true personality, but I allow **_everyone_** to know my intelligence."

"For work?"

"To show off. Rub it in their faces. Nothing pisses off the British populace quite like exemplary intelligence."

"Keep talking, I need the distraction."

"There are always fools willing to attempt a coercion of the different. The unashamedly intelligent have this worst of all. Even society doesn't like them, despite benefiting most from their works. They don't fit in. They don't keep their head down and follow the rules. They want more. They ask questions. That's dangerous for those in power, to be considered by such intellectually powerful individuals. So what do they do?" Sherlock brandished his palms. "Tarnish the reputation of the individual. The only one that matters is the intellectual ad hominem. Of course everyone makes mistakes, but heuristics has shown people still fall for it. So they call the genius mad. He is heard - and laughed at. No longer a threat to the placid normality of the population they are compared with. Few outcomes are sadder. A disorder in the clinical set is merely a clustering of behavioural traits or character states which is unusual in the population at large. Their attribution to values, to good or bad, right or wrong, is entirely dependent on culture and perspective. Normal people see from one side of the mirror. It's called mental illness for a reason: if you don't suffer from it, they don't count it. Jahoda's six criteria for ideal mental health get the gist, google it if you get time. However, there is a common misconception that harm to others counts. But for it to do so, that harm must be definable. Imagine the number of people insulted on the Internet. Everyone has a different pain scale. Some have their widdle feelings hurt every five minutes; about work, a relationship or something dramatic about life in general. Others are made from sterner stuff, with a few taking offence to nothing at all. Hence, counting the perceived slights of acquaintances is a useless pursuit, for it is unfalsifiable. The individual in isolation should be considered, for even in a vacuum of no other people, mental illness will develop. The trigger pull is the last point in a very long chain of events, remember."

"Yeah, I'll remember that" John replied, deep in thought. His cup of tea was empty. "Here's my cup of kindness" he handed it back for a refill.

"Have you seen my screensaver?" Sherlock replaced the vanishing tea.

"For what?"

"Computer." Sherlock brought it over and his long fingers danced briefly. He showed it to John.

Three words. **_Never like them_**

"What does that mean?"

"Think about it and get back to me."

John's mouth twitched. He knew Sherlock had set a brainteaser to distract him and he was grateful for it. Sherlock began drinking his own tea and picked up the paper.

Sherlock chuckled.

"Reading the celebrity gossip pages? Not like you." John frowned.

"No." Sherlock looked up. "Financial. The EU is a joke everyone else is just starting to get."

"I know you predicted this, but you needn't delight in it so much. Seems like the kind of thing Moriarty would do."

Sherlock sniffed righteously, "Moriarty assembles the pieces on the board and allows them to slaughter one another. I just watch proceedings. I tried to warn a few politicians, but they weren't about to listen to some kid fresh out of Uni. Now they're fetching pales of water for a fire." Sherlock looked at John with a wry smile. "Ignorant of how water makes chemical burns worse."

"But what can they do?"

"Wait. It's too far gone now. Has been for years. The chain is breaking and it will lead to political embezzlement."

"Did you tell Lestrade?"

"Of course. As he said, it's not our division."

John switched on the TV. "Shit..." he mused.

"Yes, John. Bullshit. It's beginning to stick to the fan."

Sherlock hovered over to the window, opened it and inhaled deeply, bobbing his head from side to side and humming 'London's Burning'. He threw himself back into the chair with abandon.

"Sociopath. You enjoy disaster far too much."

"Haha, I enjoy being proven right." He grinned.

"Why do you bother? All these cases. Surely it seems unrelenting, chasing a dream of peace?"

Sherlock shifted in his chair.

"That is not your **question**."

"Then what, pray tell, is?"

Sherlock looked down his nose at John, as he always did when heavily appraising his options. His head snapped back like a viper, the impact softened by the head cushion on the chair.

"Why am I good?"

"Why **_are_ **you good?"

"I'm **not**."

John scoffed.

Sherlock took a deep breath and looked over at his violin. He flicked his fingers over at it in gesture. "If only I were a good man, it is not for goodness itself. Goodness doesn't exist, as Einstein pointed out. Did you know the violin is the most difficult instrument to master?" Sherlock paused for a response.

"I had heard something like that."

"Similarly, I am 'good', because it is the more taxing path. I once read a sentiment which elocuted it perfectly. That, it is a greater thing, to have the **_capacity_** for evil, and to overcome it, than any show of force of strength misused. Power lies in the control of **_itself_**, or else it self-destructs. Burns from the inside out, like an atomic bomb."

John breathed out sharply. "Phew. That's a relief."

"You won't get rid of me that easily."

"What drives you? Tells you what's good if there's no such thing?"

"Others. A negative example. I could never... I would never want to do the things those," he voice turned acidic, "**_people_**, do." Sherlock mumbled, it sounded to John like 'mindless.'

"Being like them... it's like a death sentence. I'd rather _**die**, _than be like them."

"How do you know, when you've succeeded?"

"When? Oh John, your faith in me is darling." He touched John's hand. "Every day is a success. Every case. It never finishes, except at my dying breath, when I can rest and sink into that vacant abyss of nothingness." He sank his head back into the cushioning of the chair and closed his eyes happily. "To **lie quiet** in an asphodel field for a moment, stretched for all time. No thoughts racing around my head like a melting pot, forever scalding my efforts at living." He put a hand to his forehead and it wrinkled.

"Does that idea please you?"

"Yes, however much it might disgust you. I know the only way soldiers cope sometimes is the promise of a heaven, a paradise, but a continuation of **_my_** existence is not in anyone's best interest. Those that live long, live to lose themselves."

They finished their tea in the usual companionable silence.

* * *

><p>Later, as John attempted to tidy the piles of paperwork Sherlock had been casting into chaos, he found a stationery box. A small, common, plastic box. It contained a scattering of pens and curiously, a condom. John replaced the lid and tried to ignore it. It pressed in on his mind. It was out of the ordinary for a man like Sherlock, who'd taught him never to ignore the out of place.<p>

He knocked softly on Sherlock's door and asked about it.

"Just in case."

By that time, Sherlock had informed John of his virgin status. "In case of what?"

"Oh John, do you want me to draw you a diagram?" His toothy grin was cheeky and took about ten years off his face.

John frowned. He walked over to the desk and fetched the object in question. Sherlock stayed in his doorway and watched with amusement. "Why would a virgin buy a condom pre-emptively? It's too weird."

"Have we met?" Sherlock held out a hand to shake.

As John held it up to Sherlock's deadpan face, he saw the expiration date on the back. "The date says three years from now. You bought this recently."

"Excellent! You're learning." Sherlock pointed at him. "Indeed I did. Old one needed replacing." His smile was too fleeting for John's suspicions to be allayed. He pressed the matter further.

Sherlock became impatient. "It seems to be **_important_**. One of those quintessentially human hobbies." His tone turned nonchalant "I must experience it at least _once_ before I die."

John caught a whiff of a lie, the act was too perfect, "Why do you think you're going to die so soon, Sherlock?"

Sherlock's entire manner hardened to stone.

" ...Sherlock? Answer me. If you've been having ...**_thoughts_**-"

"It's a precaution, Doctor. Only a precaution." Sherlock stepped back and closed the door in John's face. He didn't emerge for the rest of the night.


	10. Captain Jack Harkness

Sherlock stepped out of the post office and cut a swathe through the crowds of tourists in the street.

John was stepping out of a restaurant with a pretty woman. He didn't see Sherlock until it was too late.

"Another one, John? Excellent" he patted him on the shoulder in passing and shouted over his shoulder "you can tell me all about it before bed tonight. Your turn to bring the wine!"

John got in early that night and stood in front of Sherlock, who was happily reading.

"Romeo, romeo," he rolled his r's, "wherefore art thou Ro-meo."

"Cock-block Sherlock."

"What are you talking about?"

"She refuses to believe I'm single. Said we're 'too familiar'."

"Ah well, plenty more fish and all that jazz."

"She's a former model. I was this close" he held up a thumb and finger, "to getting a shag."

"Close but no, ahem, cigar."

John feigned being deaf. "What's that, Sherlock? You want me to what? To? To slap you until you come to your senses? Well, if you insist..."

"John!" Sherlock shouted between ducking slap attempts from John made too wide to retain proper stance. "John! It's subtext, remember! I didn't say-!" John swung a little too widely at Sherlock and flung himself forward with it. Sherlock considered in a microsecond about moving but remembered proper falling technique which John obviously wouldn't know. They both keeled over and landed in a heap on the rug. Sherlock moaned about his head hurting, called it his Precious, and John moaned about Sherlock crushing his arm and pinning him down under his massive shoulders.

"Interrupting?" A stunned Lestrade stood in the doorway, and went to turn to leave.

"NO!" They both barked. "It's subtext!"

"I brought you a present."

Sherlock leapt up like a coiled spring and pulled John up by the arm.

"A case?"

"A veritable mindfuck of a case, yes."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, let me put it this way," Lestrade got a twinkle in his eye Sherlock rolled his eyes at, "there's something strange. In the neighbourhood."

John caught on "There's something weird-"

"Oh no, it's contagious-" Sherlock pined, ignored.

"And it don't look good. Who you gonna call?" Lestrade looked at John.

"Not. Me." Sherlock finished bluntly.

"Aw, you ruined that" Lestrade said, hands stuffed into pockets.

"I don't do psychics, ESP, EVP, hauntings, psychic fairs, or any other manner of oddities you throw my way to wind me up. Remember that psychic I almost punched?"

"Ghostbusters – wait, what? What psychic?" John added timidly.

"He calls him The Borer, Acor-" Lestrade was interrupted.

"They're a waste of my time. And you want answers, yes? I can't get reason out of most of those people."

"But you're our only hope-"

"Anakin" John finished.

Sherlock huffed. "You two are a terrible influence."

"This coming from the puppet master" Lestrade pointed.

John had a sudden mental picture of Sherlock looking down on everyone. _Eerily _a_ccurate_. "Can't hurt to take a look, surely."

Sherlock opened a drawer and glanced at the scientific contents therein. He appeared satisfied. "Let's go, but we're taking coffee on the way."

"I'm buying" Lestrade placated.

The detour included a coffee stop and a brief interval where Lestrade picked up some papers from the office.

Sherlock amuses himself at office visits by building various weapons in Lestrade's office. Today it's an improvised crossbow. Which he fired at the picture of Anderson's face on the wall photo of staff members.

"Excellent aim." Lestrade noted when he came back for them.

"Thank you." Sherlock bowed.

* * *

><p>A tall chiseled American swaggered onto the scene.<p>

John tried to pull rank while Sherlock was making an assessment and pulled out his military ID, telling the "prick in braces" to "make yourself scarce."

The man pulled out his own ID, read 'Cpn. Jack Harkness', grinned dozily and added "Snap!"

"Bugger."

"Not now, I'm working." Jack Harkness winked. "Promising start though, last time I worked with a cute Doctor, I only got a kiss out of it."

Sherlock slithered into view and addressed Jack as Captain.

"Have we met?"

"No, I saw you talking to my John."

"Ah, my reputation precedes me."

"Your cologne precedes you."

"Hey, whatever works." Jack ventures a hand.

Sherlock shook it firmly without removing his gloves and they exchanged names. "Well?"

"What?"

"When are you taking over this case?"

John scoffs. "He's not-"

"Oooh, clever clogs." The Captain eyed Sherlock up. "I like that."

"You're not from around here, are you?"

Jack's face became smooth with an unusual reserve. "Almost too clever."

"I'll remind you my brother is among the highest members of the secret service and I've worked with him on cases before. If you require another brain on your team - for the more interesting cases only, contact me through him."

"What about your website?"

John interjected excitedly "You read that?"

"On the way here. My team pulled up the files of all associated members to the department." Sherlock looked impressed for once. "Speaking of my team…" A stern looking woman in a leather jacket shoved Anderson out of his haunt at the entrance doorway.

Sherlock smiled. "I like _her_."

"She's a peach."

Sherlock's head swiveled to scrutinize the Captain. _Pre World War word use. Clothes match. Clean boots. Clean cuffs. Alien accent. Traveler. _"Which planet are you from?"

"A galaxy far, far away."

"Are there any others like you?"

Jack's eyes twinkle. "Not in this world." John looked perplexed at the exchange, as if Sherlock were flirting.

"What's the time Captain, my watch is broken?"

Jack looked to his wrist, exposing the technological lump which had shown in the outline of the sleeve before. Sherlock used the fleeting seconds to memorize the device's unbelievably advanced appearance. He registered in some recess of his brain that the Captain had told him the time.

"Ah, thank you. Well come now, John, let's leave the Captain to this one."

"What? Why?"

"If he needs us, he'll call us." Sherlock offered Jack a parting handshake and briefly pumped just once.

"Er, ok, bye? Do you know what happened?" John looked puzzled.

"I know this _Captain_ is more than capable of handling this type of case. We have other leads on other cases waiting John..." Sherlock tried to steer John away without obviously holding him by the waist. The boys on the force would talk.

"You know, what I find odd?" Jack half-shouted across the street, a thumb in a brace over his shirt.

Sherlock stopped and turned.

"Your watch is working again, I noticed when I shook your hand."

"It must be your energetic presence. Alas, time stops for no man. Laterz."

He heard Jack laughing as he walked off toward the Tube station with John in tow, who was out loud pondering if Jack was the guy he'd seen in a gay bar once cage dancing in military uniform.

"Friend's birthday party." He explained.

Sherlock's mind ticked over all he'd just seen and was filing it away for personal research.


	11. Tarts

"What are you baking?" John walked in after visiting his sister.

"Graphics card."

"Sounds delicious."

"Mmmm..." Sherlock bent over and inhaled. "Pixels."

"I feel I should keep an eye on you, or you'll end up in hospital."

"Years too late. I started landing in A&E after experiments gone awry in my teens. They refused to believe I hadn't been doing extreme sports at the time."

"Ooh, that bad?"

"Yeah, offered me morphine." Sherlock removed the polka dot oven mitts Mrs Hudson had left them with the flat.

"They don't give that stuff to kids."

"I was in a lot of pain and they just offered me it like 'hey want some morphine kid?' What use to them would I be drugged up?"

"Maybe they just wanted to shut you up."

Sherlock stalled. He hadn't thought of that. "Explains the happy pills they slipped in before visiting hours."

"Slipped in?"

"Wasn't on my chart."

"But you took them? If they slipped them in how did you know what they were?"

"Only a fool accepts something without reading it. The tiny marks on pills are writing, in case you hadn't noticed."

"You took them on purpose."

Sherlock smiled. "Something to get me through the ordeal. One night longer I'd planned to stage a breakout, and I wasn't alone."

John brought up the tv guide. Nothing decent. Again.

"Most Haunted, I could use a laugh." Sherlock nodded to the screen.

"You don't believe in life after death?"

"Logically impossible. If there's life, it can't have really died, could it?"

"One of my old army barracks was haunted."

"Did you go ghost hunting?"

"Tried a couple of times."

"Night vision goggles? EMF meter? Proton packs?"

"Not that far. Walked around in the dark with a torch for an hour drunk."

"See anything unusual?"

"A superior returning from a night out crossdressing."

"Terrifying."

"He was holding his chicken fillets in one hand and heels in the other."

"How practical."

"There can't be so much evidence without a cause."

"Faulty electrics, poor plumbing and an electromagnetic leak causing hallucinations. I do see your point in a few rare cases, however. Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. I'd love to experiment on a telekinetic. Occam's razor can be too restrictive."

"There should be a Sherlock's razor to replace it, you're certainly sharp enough. Ask Anderson."

"Ouch John, you cut me with my own words, do I not bleed?"

"Your wardrobe suggests you're cut but I doubt a Spock-staring alien like you could bleed."

"Vulcan. Spock is half-human, half-Vulcan. I've surmised I'm Data, the android who solves mysteries across space." Sherlock looked out of the window wistfully.

"You've thought about it. Popular culture's usually too predictable to keep you busy."

"Science fiction is tomorrow's fact. I need to keep abreast of the trends." Sherlock straightened his cuff."I'd thought you liked my clothes?"

"I do, only a bit dark, eh? Goth grown up?"

"Same colours as the asexual pride flag and the blue matches my eyes. A high visibility jacket wouldn't work well in alleyways."

"Spent a lot of time in alleys?"

"Oh yes, I'm quite catlike by now." Sherlock leapt up and landed poised in a crouch on his chair.

John looked over at the time. Approximately midnight, snack time.

"No fighting over food, Sherlock, we're too English to make much noise."

"Not hungry."

"No, your stomach learned a long time ago growling gets it nowhere. Poor wastrel of a thing has lost its voice. That's where I come in."

"Sherlock's stomach whisperer."

John took out the tea tray and brought over a selection.

"Three cherry bakewells, stat."

"Doctor's orders." Sherlock nibbled the edges off neatly before taking big bites.

"When you haven't eaten in a while with your complexion you look like you belong on Molly's table."

"She'd like that" Sherlock added evenly.

"You be nice to her." John pointed sternly.

"I am 'nice', she's very nice, that's why it'd never work."

"I'm not getting involved. Your brain bermuses me, let us never speak of your other organs."

Sherlock raised an eyebrow and worked through his second tart. He didn't look away from Watson, he seemed to be waiting for something.

"All I'll say is this-" John started. Sherlock's piercing eyes narrowed momentarily.

"She loves spending as much time around dead people as you. You don't have to be psychic to know how useful that can be."

Sherlock picked up the last of the tart trio and balanced it on his thigh. "Useful?"

"Don't start. She's a sweet girl and for some reason she's sweet on you."

"The epic tragedies are always bitter-sweet."

John pursed his lips like he was sucking on a slice of lemon and ignored him.

"I wonder which of us would die at the end" Sherlock said to himself, staring at the last bakewell. He put it in the fridge. "Enough, I've lost my appetite. G'night."

"Sweet dreams."

Sherlock cackled as he shuffled his weary feet to his bedroom. He laid awake thinking, staring at the ceiling like he used to every night in the days before John. Light peeked at his curtains when his eyelids summoned Mr Sand Man.


	12. Moran

The slim man in the leather jacket sat crouched beside the bath, making a common handgun jut out of his pocket. His curious eyes rolled across the occupant, a young woman with auburn hair which formed messy tendrils cupping pale breasts. The wild fire in her brown eyes had diminished now, the water was a muddy red. The man wondered how dazed she looked as her last performance was over.  
>His phone rang, he answered the small silvery slab immediately.<p>

"Boss?"

"Are you finished?" came a dull Irish drawl.

"Yes." He leant an elbow casually on the bathtub's lip.

"Did it go smoothly?"

"Without a hitch" he mused, looking over the flawless gash.

"Sebastian, please, show some respect. This was better than a yacht dump."

Sebastian sighed and lazily let his fingertips dip below the surface. He swirled them around "Under the sea, under the sea-"

"Darling it's better, down where it's wetter." His master rejoined. "Come back to me."

Sebastian stood, wiped his fingers on black jeans. "Yes, Sir."


	13. Heatwave

_Saturday evening, high summer._

John fidgeted in front of the television. Sherlock was used to it.

John was fidgeting more than usual. Sherlock ignored it.

"Let's go out."

"Let's not."

"Come on, you need to socialize."

"Why?" Sherlock didn't look up from his sheet music.

"It's healthy."

"For what?" Sherlock met John's look, considering the parts of the human body.

"My sanity."

"Have fun" Sherlock waved shortly.

"This heat'll be the death of me, I swear."

"I'm amazed you lasted so long in jumpers."

"You mean impressed" John bragged.

"Yes, John, I was impressed. You were boiling your brain for the sake of comfort."

"Style has a price. Who would've known we'd get a heat wave?"

"Solar cycles." Sherlock reminded simply, he'd been bleating about them since March, NASA charts included.

"Yes well I didn't believe you, did I, smartarse." John fanned himself with a copy of New Scientist. "I could've _died_."

"Here lies John - smothered by his lover, his jumper. Wouldn't be a cold case."

"Come out. Come with me, c'mon."

"Why, what is there to gain? Fresh air, stale conversation."

"You don't need a reason."

Sherlock stared down his nose at John. He was intimidating when he wanted.

"Meet people?"

"Have you met 'people'? People suck."

"Have fun?"

"Can I play with them?" Sherlock posed innocently.

"No mindgames. Last girl had to have therapy."

"Who?"

"Jasmine?"

"Oh, yes" Sherlock grinned wickedly.

"You can chill, relax-"

"There's no relaxing around them. They only care for three topics. The professional, and I'd rather be at work, the moral, where they play Bleeding Heart Bingo and the sexual, and that's simply pathetic."

"And who's got the energy in this heat?" John had to agree this once. They sat quietly for a few minutes, John blatantly thinking. Sherlock imagined he could almost hear it. "We could..." John hovered.

"What?" Sherlock's curiosity was piqued.

"Treat it as an experiment..." he ventured tentatively.

Sherlock played it cool "In?"

"The drinking habits in different personalities?"

Sherlock pulled a severe face "I haven't studied those."

"Prime opportunity. Lots of people out drinking in this weather."

Sherlock stacked his sheet music and John knew he'd won. "I'll get my coat."

"Nah, Sherlock, it's too-"

"Where I go, the coat goes."

"No scarf!" John shouted into the hallway.


	14. Plague

Sherlock swirled through the Tube traffic to narrowly avoid touching anyone.

"They don't have plague, Sherlock."

"That _one_ squirrel in America, John."

"Shut up and hurry up, I don't wanna miss this beer tasting session. Sounds like heaven."

"Speaking doesn't slow me down" he swerved around a Rubenesque Texan "or I'd never move."

They caught the Jubilee line before the doors closed. "Yes, Sherlock, you're very smart. Do you want a bloody award?"

"I'd probably give it to you, for putting up with me."

John harrumphed and grabbed a lemon rail roughly.

"Did you know-" Sherlock began.

The carriage sighed in unison before John interrupted "I don't believe you're a brain. You're allowed to be a person too" and nodded at the quiet, exasperated patrons.

When they stepped off John sidled up to the looming shade. "Go on."

"Oh no, conforming is too important, wouldn't want to embarrass you, would I?"

"You don't embarrass me, I just didn't want an entire carriage of people listening in on us."

"There are microphones in the carriages, John."

"You'd better be fucking joking."

"By no means all, but some of them are bugged. Regardless, the CCTV slides could theoretically render a facsimile of lip reading."

"Is that why you speak with a flat mouth most of the time?"

"Elementary, my dear Watson."

Sherlock's Oyster Card was not an Oyster Card. John regarded it for the split second before the crush of the queue imposed itself upon his back. "That looks illegal" he whispered into Sherlock's ear.

"There are no laws specifically against it" he swiped something black of similar shape through the machine.

John swiped his card and caught up to Sherlock "There should be."

"Lacuna matata."

John tried to peek as Sherlock replaced it into his wallet. "What is it?"

Sherlock smirked and strolled, toying with the idea of blanking him in return.

"Don't be a prat."

"_You_ were a prat." The reserve on Sherlock's face made John aware he'd wounded the man.

"Yes, I was. I'm sorry. Now make with the shiny." Sherlock opened a hand to show a black graphite card, he had only appeared to replace it in his wallet. "Sly motherfucker" John laughed.

"RFID, NFC tech. Mifare chip, easily cracked. Free travel - theoretically."

"How?"

"Studying the signal transfer with the reader. Remember: if it can be made, it can be faked."

"Trivial application, why waste your time on it?"

"Think so? They use the same cards for access to government buildings." He twirled the card between his fingers like a magician "I cloned Mycroft's cards." He looked over at John with a mock innocence "For his own good."

"Speaking of sheep-" John opened his hands as they stepped into the open air, only to be blocked from the pavement by tourists.

"I'll get the squirrel" Sherlock glared and they parted. 

* * *

><p>Author's Note: #1. Answering review question in non-PM, out of JohnSherlock, I would be *a* Sherlock. Sadly, being female means people take a dim view of my anti-agreeable attitude, compared to even a fictional male person. #2. PM - I included Moran in that flashback because fuck knows when we're getting Season 3, I'm pretty sure the likes of Moftiss don't really know yet because of post-production and Christmas scheduling hiccups (I have friends in with the BBC) so I figured why not and just ignore it if you don't like it. #3. You can 'review' with topic ideas you'd like to see, I don't bite and I can usually work it in at some point, I enjoy the challenge. :)


End file.
